System Info

On most Windoze games, the check for hardware is part of the install or a one-time thing when you run the game. It isn't saying "Hey, look, you have a crappy computer," it's saying "We found this information about your computer and wanted to let you know that the game may not run as expected." If you tell it to go away, it does, never to bug you again.

I don't think this is a bad thing, especially if you want to attract Windoze gamers.

You're missing the point. The game can tell what hardware you have and check it against what is required to run the game so when something go horribly wrong (or it's just plain slow) the player knows what's wrong.

No one buys a game because it tells them they can't run it. Most able-bodied gamers know to check the box for minimum requirements (or they have such a powerful machine that they don't need to check). However, it's also a well-known fact that the average consumer reads absolutely 0% of the manual or any other text given to them.

So instead of just la-de-da'ing on and allowing the game to install and run without so much as a peep all the while saying to itself "yeah, I can tell your Rage Pro ain't going to cut it but I'm not going to tell you" and letting the user find out the hard way instead most commercial games say "we thought you'd like to know your Rage Pro may have issues but you can tell us to scram if you'd like."

In the case of do-or-die it's imperative that you tell the user what's wrong, there is no argument for that. In the case of do-or-suck, it's also imperative to tell the user what may be wrong. Otherwise the game sucks because it's too slow, not because they have 7 year old hardware.

I have to agree with Ian on this. It is kind of the game to let the user know that their system is not quite what the game expects, but that they can continue playing if they are having fun. There is nothing wrong with that. OneSadCookie is right that the game should not refuse to run just because the minimum requirements aren't met.... the game could still be fun to some people.

Deekpyro, are you writing your game in Carbon or Cocoa? In Carbon I think you can find out about much of the system through the Gestalt() call. In Cocoa you probably have to do some sort of kernal level checking... I'm not sure.